The Mink City Court on 2 February ruled to sentence the Russian website Regnum authors Yury Pavlovets, Sergei Shiptenko and Dmitry Alimkin to five years in prison and three years of suspended sentence - exactly what the prosecutor had requested. They were released in court. Pavlovets, Shiptenko and Alimkina were found guilty of committing deliberate actions aimed at instigating ethnic hostility by a group of people.

The high-profile trial began on 18 December 2017. The Regnum authors had remained behind bars since late 2016. Shiptenko and Pavlovets initially were charged with instigating racial, ethnic and religious hostility as well as illegal entrepreneurship (they received honoraria for the articles sent to Moscow). Alimkin was charged only with instigating hostility. All of the defendants plead non-guilty and are set to appeal the ruling in a higher court.